


Starlight

by xSparklingRavenx



Category: End of Eternity | Resonance of Fate
Genre: Fluff, Gen, Stargazing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-07
Updated: 2013-10-07
Packaged: 2017-12-28 17:43:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,390
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/994735
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/xSparklingRavenx/pseuds/xSparklingRavenx
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Just wait and see." he replies, and Leanne frowns because she knows he’s trying to be intentionally cryptic. She can almost imagine Zephyr rolling his eyes beside her. “I've had my eye on this for a while, waiting for the right kind of night. You’re going to love it, I’m sure.”</p>
<p>The trio head outside the tower and talk about everything and nothing at all. Set post game.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Starlight

**Author's Note:**

> Phew! I actually posted this a few months ago on tumblr, but I feel like it's one of my favourite pieces, so I decided to give it a home here too. This trio gives me too many feels.

It's the sky that takes Leanne by surprise the most.

She walks slowly, in time with her two companions, and she wonders idly where Vashyron is taking them. He'd seemed so excited that evening, dragging them out of the house before they were ready, not giving them time to gather anything except what they had on them. Leanne had only just managed to slip a gun into one holster before  Vashyron rushed them out of the door and they were out on 11th street, their leader walking briskly ahead. "Hurry up." he'd said airily, not giving them the chance to catch up.

He'd taken them down all three Core Lifts without telling them where they were going, and it was only when they got to Level 12 she'd realised they were going outside. _Outside,_ that foreign, strange idea that most of Basel's residents disregard without a second thought. She's only been out there once, maybe twice, and never at night.

"Come on," Vashyron had said cheerfully as they'd stepped out of Basel's metal foundations and onto the grass. Leanne had looked up then and she'd stopped thinking because there were no words to describe what she had been seeing.

Stars, millions and millions of small bright lights, each one dotting itself along an inky black canvas to create something beautiful, something _otherworldly._ She'd breathed out in wonder as she'd taken it in, the sight not being something she had expected.

The air outside is different to that in Basel, a cool, refreshing breeze that makes her shiver. It's a exhilarating change from the stilted gusts that blow through the gears in Ebel City and make awful whistling sounds on stormy evenings. She can feel Zephyr's eyes on her as she rubs her arms for a little warmth,  but he doesn't say anything. She has a feeling she knows what he's thinking anyway, given the way he keeps tugging at the edge of his jacket as if he wants to pull it off.

Vashyron has moved ahead, his long strides overtaking theirs easily. "Where are we going?" Leanne asks, dropping her hands to the sides and quickening her pace to keep up with him. The grass beneath her boots makes no sound as she steps on it, so unlike the footpaths of Basel which are noisy and stiff. She's not sure if she likes the stark contrast.

"Just wait and see." he replies, and Leanne frowns because she _knows_ he's trying to be intentionally cryptic. She can almost imagine Zephyr rolling his eyes beside her. "I've had my eye on this for a while, waiting for the right kind of night. You're going to love it, I'm sure."

"The right kind of night?" she repeats to herself,  trying to pick out the meaning. She looks back up at the sky. _Does he mean...?_

Vashyron stops when they're a fair distance away from Basel, in the middle of a field that expands outwards in every direction. "Vashyron-" she starts, only to cut herself short as he suddenly lets himself fall onto his back, his arms spread out wide at his sides and his eyes focusing directly upwards. "Eh?"

"What are you doing?" Zephyr asks, his tone almost exasperated.

"Look." Vashyron points upwards, bringing his other arm beneath his head as a pillow. "Well? Aren't you two kids going to join me?"

Leanne tilts her head in puzzlement but sits beside him nonetheless. Zephyr looks up briefly before deciding to sit on his other side, stretching his arms out as he does so.  "You wanted to show us this?" she murmurs, winding a lock of hair around her index finger.

"You're not impressed?" Vashyron quips light-heartedly. "You wound me. I go to all this effort and you're _still_ not satisfied? I don't remember raising such a fickle kid."

She instantly feels bad. "No, no I didn't mean it like that-!"

He chuckles at her outburst. "I'm just kidding, Leanne."

She feels a smile come to her lips, and then she lies down too, her head resting softly on the grass. It tickles her skin where it wafts past, but it's not unpleasant. She sighs contentedly. "It's beautiful, isn't it?"

Zephyr sits forward with his knees up, leaning his arms on them. "It's not bad," he admits. "Can't you see pictures and stuff in stars?"

"Constellations?" Vashyron queries, then nods with a laugh. "Yeah, but I don't know any. Like it matters, let's make up our own."

Leanne looks hard at the small dots of light, trying to pinpoint something, anything to share with her team-mates. "This is hard." she grumbles. "I bet Jean Paulet would love this. I wonder what he'd say if he saw it."

"Mon Dieu!" Vashyron and Zephyr say together, the former in an enthusiastic shout and the latter in a sarcastic lilt. Leanne can't help herself and she splutters, and in moments the three of them are laughing uncontrollably, sprawling over the grass.

Zephyr's head  hits the greenery with a soft thump, and then he says, "I think that looks kind of like Sweet Home if you look hard."

"Sure, if you're drunk and concussed." Vashyron remarks, looking at where he's pointing. "If that looks like a house to you I'm going to need to get your eyes checked."

Zephyr clicks his tongue in annoyance, but doesn't press the subject further. "I think over there looks like Barbarella's manor," Vashyron says, and Leanne recognizes _that_ look in his eyes. "Just think of the-ow!"

He rubs his ribs where Leanne elbowed him and gives a roll of his eyes. "Vicious!" he cries. "You're vicious! You didn't even know what I was going to say."

"Oh I think I did," Leanne retorts. "Anyway, I think this one over here looks like one of those cute little dweller creatures."

"She's the one who's drunk if she thinks they're cute." Zephyr sighs. "I guess you're kind of right though. It does look a little like one."

"Thing is," Vashyron cuts in, "it can be whatever you want it to be. All about perspective, how you look at it."

"I thought you just said Zephyr's constellation-thing was wrong?"

"Ah," Vashyron grins and shrugs. "The point I'm making is that in _my_ perspective, it didn't look anything _like_ Sweet Home. See, how you look at it?"

"In other words, he doesn't know what he's talking about." Zephyr mutters.

"You just don't _understand_ what I'm talking about."

"But," Leanne says thoughtfully, "I always thought you said it was all about the possibilities, not perspective."

"I believe in both." Vashyron replies, laying his hand across his chest. "How you look at it, and what it can be. The two ideas fit, see?"

"I think I get it." Leanne nods. "So Zephyr sees it as Sweet Home, but you see it as something else because it has the potential to be anything?"

"Exactly."

"Sounds like a load of nonsense to me." Zephyr says, but his tone isn't harsh. "But...I like it this way."

"Me too." Leanne agrees, lacing her own hands together across her chest. "Just the three of us. It's nice."

"Oh no," Vashyron gasps in mock horror. "You're hardened hunters. No sappy moments allowed."

The three of them laugh together again, and Leanne looks up and she looks for Zephyr's Sweet Home, for Barbarella's manor, for the cute little dweller and she looks for whatever else she can find. If she turns her head, she thinks she can see a rose like the one Theresa gave Vashyron to lay down, the rose that Vashyron left in the Seminary. She thinks maybe, with a little bit of imagination, in another section of stars she can see a piece of quartz, shining and brilliant. It gives her an idea. "Do you think all these stars are quartz too?"

"I don't know." Vashyron confesses. "Maybe. If they are, it means each of us have one for our own. It'd be a nightmare trying to find _that_ needle in a haystack."

"We don't need a quartz to be happy." Zephyr says. "We're fine as we are."

She's a little surprised that he says that, because it's probably the closest she'll ever hear him get to saying that he's happy. She smiles, shuts her eyes, and feels the wind rush past her.

They don't go home for a long time.

                                            


End file.
